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Nova Scotia Power says it will accept a provincial plan to get morerenewable electricity from independent producers after theprovincial regulator ordered changes to a draft power purchaseagreement. The provincial Utility and Review Board issued a decision Thursday approving the proposed agreement, with four revisions. The province"s renewable electricity administrator filed adraft agreement in February but made changes last month after NovaScotia Power and others raised concerns. Utility spokeswoman David Rodenhiser said the company is pleasedthe board ordered further changes. "We"ll have to wait (for) the administrator"scompliance filing to see how those issues are addressed,"Rodenhiser said in an interview. "But customers should bebetter protected by these revisions." John Dalton of Power Advisory LLC, the independent administrator,said he will file his report early next week confirming therequired changes. "We"re happy that the board has issued the decision andessentially found that the power purchase agreement largely, as werevised it, reflects a reasonable balancing of risks betweenindependent power producers and customers," theMassachusetts-based consultant said. Nova Scotia Power and other stakeholders will have seven days torespond to the administrator"s filing. Dalton said he hopes to have final approval from the board soonafter that so developers can submit their bids in mid-June. Several wind projects are in the planning stages across theprovince, although some developers have said they expect no morethan three or four of them to be selected. The administrator said the changes ordered by the boardaren"t major and won"t affect the number of proposalshe receives. "I think that from a proponent or independent power producerperspective, they would view the changes that the board was lookingfor as favourable." Nova Scotia Power wrote the board in March saying it wouldn"tadopt the proposed agreement unless the regulator ordered it to doso. The utility said it was concerned the draft terms favouredindependent producers at the expense of ratepayers. Nova Scotia Power said several parts of the agreement could driveup rates and require customers to shoulder additional risk if aproject runs into difficulty. The last time the province issued a tender call for renewableelectricity, which occurred in 2007, the power purchase agreementwas developed by Nova Scotia Power. In its decision, the board called the proposed agreement this timearound "reasonable." "It appears to balance the interest of (independent powerproducers), NSPI and the ratepayers," the decision said. Besides the four changes, the board also ordered Nova Scotia Powerto come up with a plan to protect the confidential commercialinformation it receives from developers. The regulator noted it was "surprised and concerned"about the depth of disagreement about the proposed agreement. Besides Nova Scotia Power, consumer advocate John Merrick alsoslammed the proposed agreement. The advocate questioned the plan to build more wind farms, sayingthey are not needed to meet provincial renewable energy targets. The board said it doesn"t have the authority to determine howmuch renewable electricity the administrator should contract for. "The board would hope and expect that the (administrator)will procure renewable energy in a cost-effective manner so as tolimit any unnecessary impact on electricity ratepayers in theprovince," the decision said. Merrick couldn"t be reached for comment. ( jalberstat@herald.ca ). I am an expert from autoaircondenser.com, while we provides the quality product, such as Toyota Condenser Manufacturer , Auto Air Conditioning Evaporator, Ford Condenser,and more.
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